Ken23

You people are obsessing too much on these loyalty points... I don't even pay attention to them (wink wink)

Yay!!! All is well in the universe!!!


ATTN: @Mark_A & @Chadster

I just realized that as of Monday, I have reached Diamond Level!  I had 73 points when I got onboard the Allure last Sunday.  If my reckoning of the Double Points promo is correct, together with the double points I’d gotten as a solo cruiser, I am now (unofficially) Diamond. Yay!
 

I don't know how long this will last, but here are the prices I saw on Cruise Planner today (9/21/2020) at 1:20 pm PST for Anthem OTS Norwegian Fjords 16-24 July 2021:
 
DBP (it says including gratuity!): $46/day; total for each DBP was $368, so it looks like gratuity was included in the price.
DBP + 1 Device VOOM: $54/day ("Each adult of legal drinking age assigned to the same stateroom must purchase this package. Price shown is per person, per day.).  I couldn't tell if this meant that both had to buy DBP + Voom 1 Device)
VOOM 1 Device: $11.49/day
VOOM 2 Device: $17.99/day

Michelle is awesome. Transferring my rebooking to her after the first round of cancellations was the best thing I could have done.

Agreed that location doesn't mater.  I've had two agents at MEI one in FL and one in VA while I'm in MA and they were both responsive and very helpful.  I highly recommend Michelle over there she's great!

Michelle Cunningham is in VA if it matters.  She is really good....but I have not heard anything but positives about all of the MEI agents.  They REALLY earn their commission (which is paid by the cruise lines...not us).
[email protected]
703-986-0661
 

@Lovetocruise2002 We hid a little note for you in the room.  I think I put it somewhere easy for you to find with clues, but not somewhere that it will be taken by someone else or found by the cabin attendant.  ?

Funny way these two classes came about.  Izzy scheduled us in for the Sushi class without us even asking. I was going to ask him to take it off but Hubby and the kids wanted to leave it so we did.
 
The Guacamole class idea was actually from a post by someone here on the message boards. Someone was wondering what it would be like now that Sabor was gone and that left me wondering too. I got curious and took a look at the cruise planner and noticed that tequila is included with that class. Checked with Izzy to see if it was complementary and it is, so who am I to turn down complimentary tequila! ? And we also love guacamole and chips. ?

Glad we got you all worked out Ken- thanks for trusting us at MEI-Travel to help you out

It's Official, booked the missing link to my B2B2B today.  Sailing three weeks on the Oasis starting 3/8/20.  I am sure that many on this blog have experienced this amazing opportunity but I feel pretty luck to do it at 50.  Now let's pray for a great cabin as I did Interior Guar!  I am on deck 12 mid in a CPB for 3/8 and deck 8 aft OVB for 3/22.

First, I agree with everything that everyone has said.
Now, let me come at this from a different direction. Once upon a time, I was a cocktail waitress in college. Meaning, I have worked in an environment where tipping is done. And I saw ALL sorts. From the entitled "you should be paying me for the honour of waiting on me" types to the "hey, you're pretty, here's a hundred bucks for existing" types. And everything in between.
I think, at the end of the day, people who are in the service industry (at least myself and those I worked with as a waitress and later on when I was a bartender) get that not everyone is loaded with cash to throw around. I do think there is a general expectation from those who wait on you to have you pay your bill for what you have ordered and (where/when appropriate) leave a gratuity. And, yes, on the rare occasion, it's super nice if someone rich gives you more out of the kindness of their heart (it happens) or because they are trying to show off.
But here is the thing. On the other side, they can tell usually (especially after spending a week dealing with them) who is showing off, who is being kind, who is being an ass, and who is giving what they can. While you have entitled people everywhere, when working in the service industry personally, I would tell you that if you were a decent client who didn't berate me or demand ridiculous things or constantly complain then I'd already feel like I'd won. If you paid your expected RC gratuity then, excellent. Good to go. If you'd tipped me ON TOP of that, even if only $10, then I'd have been super appreciative that you'd thought enough of my time and attention to go above and beyond.
At the end of the day (as I think you have gathered from the other responses) you have nothing to be ashamed of. Anyone trying to make you feel ashamed has their own issues they are dealing with and chances are you could have tipped double what you tipped and someone would have said it still wasn't enough. There are some people that it will never be enough for. From the other side of the table, from the service side, I'd rather have a kind client who tipped me the absolute minimum but wasn't a PITA all week. Having dealt with PITAs, I can say there is no amount of money in the world for putting up with some peoples' *ahem*.
I'd be like, "Here's your money back. GTFO."
No shame. You were more than generous.

We just got off. I expect that all issues have been resolved and everything will be “smooth sailing” from now on. I think we may have been just a tad late getting to port but everything went great with disembarkation.  I don’t recall Port Liberty having facial recognition last year but it was in place today and we breezed off the ship without even stopping.  It was really an easy disembark.  Everything on the ship operated normally. There seem to be zero issues related to last week’s problems. I would expect a normal boarding and cruise.
 
I wasn’t too thrilled with the 18 degree weather that greeted us but not much you can do about that in NJ in Feb !  Because it was so cold we decided to just grab a taxi to the airport rather than standing around outside in the cold waiting for an Uber to show up.  UUUGE mistake.  $73. Our Uber ride over was $18.80.  Now I see why nobody takes a taxi anymore. How do they even stay in business ?  I guess they catch the few country suckers like us !
 
 We had an awesome (even if abbreviated) cruise and we are SO glad we went.  It was basically a free cruise for us. They refunded waaay more to us than we expected (more than 50% of our cruise fare, for sure) and our FCC (also more than we expected)  has already been applied to our Oct 11 2020 Brilliance cruise. The reduced crowds (often a problem on Anthem) made walking on the Esplanade and waiting for elevators so much better. Our chance meetings with Yen made it especially enjoyable. 
 
Enjoy your cruise ! Anthem is awesome !

I go to the Oasis Lagoon, throw my stuff on a lounger and hit the pool.   I stay there all day by the swim up bar.    Team DX so no worries.
 

Every time I go to cococay (or Labadee) I do the same thing.  I rent a cabana....spend 3 hours in the water....then sit in the cabana looking at the waves for a little while, eat lunch, and then spend another 3 hours in the water.
Then I waddle back to the ship with typical overweight American sand/salt water rash and get a shower saying "why did I spend so much time in the water?"
 
What an awesome time.....I can't wait for April now.
And on edit....probably doesn't answer your question ;).  There are lockers at cococay you can shove your stuff and storage if you rent a cabana

Reporting back on The World experience.  We did it !  It went off without a hitch. Showed up at the door a couple minutes before 8:00, got a table, got our dessert and were out of there in 15 minutes !  The dessert itself was scrumptious.  Worth the effort and the wait. I still will never eat dinner at Wonderland but The World was excellent. 

For those who wonder about Johnny Rockets and the dining and beverages packages...  We went to JR today for lunch (no $$ limit) and our shakes were included with our refreshments packages.  SCORE !
On a similar topic...we had dinner tonite at Chops.  I had the spicy shrimp (yummy) and Dan ordered the lamb shank being served in the MDR tonite. We advised them, when we arrived at Chops, that Dan would be ordering the lamb shank so that they would get a bit of a head’s up.  It was delivered in a timely manner and was excellent.  We decided that we were full and didn’t want dessert right then (burgers at JR may or may not have played a role, here !).  Instead, we made reservations for dessert only at Wonderland on our way back to the room. The Wonderland concierge seemed a bit confused with our request but made the reservation for us.  We intend to go to Wonderland to sample The World - finally - at 8:00. I will let everyone know that goes.  I have high expectations.  
 
So far, we have run into Yen every day of this cruise.  We’ve seen her almost as often on this cruise as we did last year when she was our Genie.  She told us that We Will Rock You has been cancelled for tomorrow (due to reduced #of pax on this cruise) and will only be performed on the last day - once in the afternoon and once in the evening.  She is such a sweetie. She told us to call her if we need anything but of course, we would never do that.

I read on another board that Anthem seems to have sailed with about 3000 pax. If that is the case it is actually not a bad turnout. I even had people at work talking about this itinerary/sailing. Two coworkers finally took the plunge and booked because they thought the way RCC handled everything was quite amazing.

We decided to go to Spectra’s Cabaret tonite. We found our way to the upper deck of 270 and Dan sat down while I went to use restroom.  On my way back to our seats I just happened to spot Yen waiting by the theater door.  I said “hello” but kept on walking as I knew, from experience, that she was waiting for some Star Class pax to arrive.  She stopped me and asked if we were here for the show; I said “yes, we’re sitting upstairs”.  She asked me if we wanted to sit up front, downstairs, that she had some seats reserved that she was not going to use.  I was very surprised and touched that she would invite us to sit in her SC reserved seats.  I went up, got Dan and went back down to enjoy the show from the front row.  She even offered to get us drinks but we declined.  I would never, ever, ever ask her to do anything like that and was very flattered that she offered.  She is a sweetie.  We enjoyed the show very much, as we did twice last year.

Here I've been debating on when/if to start a blog for our Oasis cruise, and @Lovetocruise2002 beat me to starting her blog for a sailing 3 weeks after mine...  At least I won't have to put all of the precruise genie stuff.  

You can count on that!  I will be having lunch and dinner there at some point and that Spiked Palmer might be calling me.

The good news is that we won the Genie lottery!  (or so we've been told ?)

“Follow that STAR…Our Journey back to Oasis.” - March 15-22, 2020
Oasis…
” A fertile or green spot in the desert, a shelter from the storm, a moment of respite from the conditions of the desert…”
We’re back with another blog and that line above pretty much sums up what this cruise means to us this time around.  Our lives, since entering dry dock back in August 2019, has been work, work, and more work.  To say that the last seven months have been busy is an understatement.  However, all is going to be well soon as we are about to embark on not just another cruise, but another Star Class adventure!
And full disclaimer!  In fear of being blog shamed (I won't mention any names here lol), I debated waiting on this one until about a week out but then I would have to back track to outline the Star Class process.  This is just easier.  Oh, and I am excited too! 
Please note that this is only 5 weeks early. ?
Let's begin...

Shoved off right on time at 3:00 on the dot. The Captain took us for a harbor tour around the Statue of Liberty and lower Manhattan.  The weather completely sucked but it was still a really nice trip.  I had heard that they did this from time-to-time, but had never been lucky enough to have it happen for us.

 
Sorry....bad picture.  I’m no a Twangster.